169 research outputs found
Causality and Determinism: Tension, or Outright Conflict?
No full textIn the philosophical tradition, the notions of determinism and causality are strongly linked: it is assumed that in a world of deterministic laws, causality may be said to reign supreme; and in any world where the causality is strong enough, determinism must hold. I will show that these alleged linkages are based on mistakes, and in fact get things almost completely wrong. In a deterministic world that is anything like ours, there is no room for genuine causation. Though there may be stable enough macro-level regularities to serve the purposes of human agents, the sense of “causality” that can be maintained is one that will at best satisfy Humeans and pragmatists, not causal fundamentalists
The Third Way on Objective Probability: A Skeptic's Guide to Objective Chance
No full textThe goal of this paper is to sketch and defend a new interpretation or theory of objective chance, one that lets us be sure such chances exist and shows how they can play the roles we traditionally grant them. The subtitle obviously emulates the title of Lewis seminal 1980 paper A Subjectivist s Guide to Objective Chance while indicating an important difference in perspective. The view developed below shares two major tenets with Lewis last (1994) account of objective chance: (1) The Principal Principle tells us most of what we know about objective chance; (2) Objective chances are not primitive modal facts, propensities, or powers, but rather facts entailed by the overall pattern of events and processes in the actual world. But it differs from Lewis’ account in most other respects. Another subtitle I considered was A Humean Guide ... But while the account of chance below is compatible with any stripe of Humeanism (Lewis , Hume s, and others ), it presupposes no general Humean philosophy. Only a skeptical attitude about probability itself is presupposed (as in point (2) above); what we should say about causality, laws, modality and so on is left a separate question. Still, I will label the account to be developed “Humean objective chance”
Histoire des Révolutions de Taïti, avec le tableau du Gouvernement, des Moeurs, des Arts et de la Réligion des Habitans de cette île, par Messire Poutavéry, Grand-Earée de Taïti
No full textNur Teil 1 erschienenVerf. ermittelt in: Hoefer, J.C. F. Nouvelle biographie génèrale, etc. 46 tom. 1852Vorlageform des Erscheinungsvermerks: Gotha, bey Carl Wilhelm Ettinger. 178
Humean Effective Strategies
No full textIn a now-classic paper, Nancy Cartwright argued that the Humean conception of causation as mere regular co-occurrence is too weak to make sense of our everyday and scientific practices. Specifically she claimed that in order to understand our reasoning about, and uses of, effective strategies, we need a metaphysically stronger notion of causation and causal laws than Humeanism allows. Cartwright’s arguments were formulated in the framework of probabilistic causation, and it is precisely in the domain of (objective) probabilities that I am interested in defending a form of Humeanism. In this paper I will unpack some examples of effective strategies and discuss how well they fit the framework of causal laws and criteria such as CC from Cartwright’s and others’ works on probabilistic causality. As part of this discussion, I will also consider the concept or concepts of objective probability presupposed in these works. I will argue that Cartwright’s notion of a nomological machine, or a mechanism as defined by Stuart Glennan, is better suited for making sense of effective strategies, and therefore that a metaphysically primitive notion of causal law (or singular causation, or capacity, as Cartwright argues in (1989)) is not – here, at least – needed. These conclusions, as well as the concept of objective probabilities I defend, are largely in harmony with claims Cartwright defends in The Dappled World. My discussion aims, thus, to bring out into the open how far Cartwright’s current views are from a radically anti-Humean, causal-fundamentalist picture
Editorial
No full textIn the editorial we present the main aims and the cultural framework of the new journal, by insisting on the importance of a deep interaction between science and philosophy
The Third Way on Objective Probability: A Skeptic's Guide to Objective Chance
No full textThe goal of this paper is to sketch and defend a new interpretation or ‘theory’ of objective chance, one that lets us be sure such chances exist and shows how they can play the roles we traditionally grant them. The account is ‘Humean’ in claiming that objective chances supervene on the totality of actual events, but does not imply or presuppose a Humean approach to other metaphysical issues such as laws or causation. Like Lewis (1994) I take the Principal Principle to be the key to understanding objective chance. After describing the main features of Humean objective chance (HOC), I deduce the validity of PP for Humean chances, and end by exploring the limitations of Humean chance
Eine gemeinsame Quelle Strabons u. des sog. Skymnos. [microform] / von Ulrich Hoefer.
No full textFilmed with: Jacobi, J. L. / Basilidis philosophii gnostici sententiae... -- Rutilius Lupus, Publius ; Jacob, Friedrich / P. Rutilii Lupi De figuris sententiarum et elocutionis libri duo... -- Jacobi, Victor Friedrich Leopold / De rebus rusticis veterum Germanorum. Part I, De veteris Germaniae... -- Jahn, Johann Christian / De P. Ovidii Nasonis et a Sabini epistolis disputatio : Pars I -- Jaep, Karl Christoph / Que anno et quibus diebus festis Aristophanis Lysistrata atque Thesmophoriazusae doctae sint -- Hölk / Aeschylus Orestie : vortrag als einführung in die antike Trilogie -- Holder-Egger, Oswald / Über die Weltchronik des sogenannten Severus Sulpitius und südgallische Annalen des fünften Jahrhunderts -- Heimback, Gustav Ernst / De origine et fatis corporis, quod CLXVIII. Novellis constitutionibus constat -- Jacobi, Olaf / In Satiras Horatianas adversaria -- Jacob, August / Ueber die behandlung der griechischen mythologie -- Höfer, Paul / Die bedeutung der philosophie für das leben nach Plato -- Xenophon. ; Heiland, Carl Gustav / Xenophontis Agesilaus -- Holzinger, Carl / Beitrage zur Erklärung des Demosthenes : 1. Dionysios oder Libanios? : Zur ersten olynthischen Rede -- Hoffmann, Otto / Eine Neugestaltung des griechischen Unterrichtes besonders des Elementarunterrichtes -- Hollander, Hermann / Die handschriftliche überlieferung der Homerischen Hymnen -- Hoffmann, Heinrich, of Erlangen / Der Zweite und dritte Hauptteil von Plato's Theätet -- Höger, Franz Christian / Kleine Beiträge zur Erklärung von Vergil's Aeneis -- Hoffmann, Otto Adalbert / Ägis oder Bogen? : beitrag zur Erklärung des Apollo von Belvedere."Beilage zum Jahresbericht des Kgl. Gymnasiums in Saarbrücken, 1901" -- Cover.Dissertation: Pr. (Saarbrücken, 1901)Microfilm.Mode of access: Internet
De la relatividad de la inercia a la geometrodinámica intrínseca : una interpretacion relacional del espacio-tiempo
No full textConsultable des del TDXTítol obtingut de la portada digitalitzadaTras el redescubrimiento del viejo argumento del agujero de Einstein (1913), por parte de Earman y Norton, al parecer se ha alcanzado un consenso estable en el debate entre sustancialistas y relacionistas sobre el estatus ontológico del espacio-tiempo. A pesar de las intenciones iniciales de Einstein de edificar el espacio-tiempo de la Relatividad General (RG) como una entidad relacional à la la Leibniz-Mach (Caps. 3-4), la mayoría de los filósofos de la ciencia se sienten cómodos con la interpretación sustancialista sofisticada del espacio-tiempo (Mundy: 1992, Brighouse:1994, Di Salle:1994, Hoefer:1996, Bartels: 1996, Pooley: 2002). Es más, la mayoría de filósofos comparten la impresión de que aunque sean posibles interpretaciones relacionales de ciertos tipos de modelos altamente restringidos de GR, en el fondo, éstos requieren estructuras espaciotemporales sustancialistas. El Sustancialismo Sofisticado (SS) es una doctrina que sostiene que, aunque los puntos de la variedad espaciotemporal no tienen una existencia robusta ya que carecen de identidad primitiva, es natural ser realista sobre la existencia del espacio-tiempo como una entidad independiente en toda regla. Dado que la variedad carece de las estructuras espaciotemporales básicas -como geometría e inercia- SS argumenta que debería contarse a la dupla variedad+métrica (M, g) como el espacio-tiempo físico independiente. El tensor métrico de GR codifica la estructura métrica e inercial así que, en cierto sentido, éste cumple el papel explicativo que desempeñaba el espacio newtoniano en la dinámica clásica. Es decir, según la interpretación SS del espacio-tiempo uno debería juzgar al campo métrico de GR como la versión moderna de un espacio-tiempo real ya que éste tiene las propiedades -o contiene las estructuras- que tenía el espacio de la dinámica newtoniana. En esta disertación intento desmantelar la impresión generalizada según la cuál una interpretación relacional de RG es inviable. Para hacerlo, empiezo por subrayar que cuando una vuelve al debate original (Leibniz-Newton) se ve que el sustancialismo resulta prima facie victorioso ya que Newton pudo formular satisfactoriamente la dinámica (Cap. 2). Sin embargo, para dar al relacionismo una oportunidad equitativa formulo las siguientes preguntas hipotéticas: ¿Qué tal si Leibniz - o algún leibniziano- hubiese tenido una teoría relacional buena? ¿Qué papel cumpliría la geometría en este tipo de teoría? ¿Sería natural tomar a la geometría y a la inercia como propiedades intrínsecas de un espacio -o espaciotiempo- sustancialista? ¿Seguiría siendo natural juzgar el campo métrico de GR como una entidad sustancialista a pesar de que éste codifica propiedades materiales importantes tales como energía-momento? Al destacar este tipo de preguntas intento arrojar dudas importantes sobre la interpretación sustancialista (SS) del campo métrico. Quizá ya empiece a ser visto como un campo material. Finalmente, para fortalecer la interpretación relacional que propongo e intentar remover cualquier remanente de tensión interpretativa, discuto cuidadosamente la relevancia de dos asuntos importantes: i) Las variables dinámicas están usualmente asociadas a objetos materiales en las teorías físicas. El campo métrico de RG es un objeto dinámico, así que sostengo que debería ser juzgado como un campo físico de materia (Cap. 5). ii) Barbour y Bertotti (BB2, 1982) han provisto una formulación alternativa de la dinámica clásica. Ésta es según Pooley y Brown (2001) una interpretación genuinamente relacional. Tanto la estructura geométrica como la estructura inercial reciben por tanto -contra SS- un tratamiento relacional (Cap. 6). La conclusión general debe ser que el espacio-tiempo es un campo material y no una entidad sustancialista independiente, como usualmente es entendido.In the aftermath of the rediscovery of Einstein's hole argument by Earman and Norton (1987), we hear that the ontological relational/substantival debate over the status of spacetime seems to have reached stable grounds. Despite Einstein's early intention to cast GR's spacetime as a relational entity à la Leibniz-Mach (chaps.3-4), most philosophers of science feel comfortable with the now standard sophisticated substantivalist (SS) account of spacetime. Furthermore, most philosophers share the impression that although relational accounts of certain highly restricted models of GR are viable, at a deep down level, they require substantival spacetime structures. SS claims that although manifold spacetime points do not enjoy the sort of robust existence provided by primitive identity, it is still natural to be realistic about the existence of spacetime as an independent entity in its own right. It is argued that since the bare manifold lacks the basic spacetime structures -such as geometry and inertia- one should count as an independent spacetime the couple manifold +metric (M, g). The metric tensor field of GR encodes inertial and metrical structure so, in a way, it plays the explanatory role that Newtonian absolute space played in classical dynamics. In a nutshell, according to the SS account of spacetime, one should view the metric field of GR as the modern version of a realistically constructed spacetime since it has the properties -or contains the structures- that Newtonian space had. I will try to dismantle the widespread impression that a relational account of full GR is implausible. To do so, I will start by highlighting that when turning back to the original Leibniz-Newton dispute one sees that substantivalism turns out prima facie triumphant since Newton was able to successfully formulate dynamics (Chap 2). However, to give relationalism a fair chance, one can also put forward the following hypothetical questions: What if Leibniz -or some leibnizian- had had a good relational theory? What role would geometry play in this type of theory? Would it be natural to view geometry and inertia as intrinsic properties of substantival space -if not spacetime? Would it still seem natural to interpret the metric field of GR along substantival lines regardless of the fact that it also encodes important material properties such as energy-momentum? After bringing these questions out into the light I will cast some important doubts on the substantival (SS) interpretation of the metric field. Perhaps the metric turns out to be viewed as a relational matter field. Finally, to strengthen the relational account of spacetime I expect to remove the possible remaining interpretative tension by carefully discussing the relevance of two important facts: i) Dynamical variables are usually linked to material objects in physical theories. The metric field of GR is a dynamical object so, I claim, it should be viewed as a matter field (Chap 5). ii) Barbour and Bertotti (BB2, 1982) have provided and alternative formulation of classical dynamics. They provide a «genuinely relational interpretation of dynamics» (Pooley & Brown 2001). Geometry and inertia become -contra SS- relational structures in BB2 (Chap 6). The general conclusion should be that spacetime is a relational matter field and not an independent substantival entity, as it is usually understood
Studies of dynamic nuclear polarization with nitroxides in aqueous solution.
No full textThe dynamic nuclear polarization effect between the nitroxide radical TEMPO and the H-1 protons of water solution was investigated at an electron pumping frequency of 9.7 GHz for different experimental conditions. In particular, we compared N-14-4-hydroxy-TEMPO (TEMPOL) with 4-oxo-TEMPO and evaluated the effect of H-2 and N-15 isotope labelling. Furthermore, we tested the effect of concomitant irradiation on both electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) lines with the N-15-labelled compound. Our results show that the reduction in the EPR line width given by the H-1 and N-15 labelling and the collapse in the number of hyperfine lines due to N-15 substitution leads to the highest enhancement of epsilon = -140 ever reported in the literature. Concomitant pumping on two hyperfine lines does not give higher enhancements at our experimental conditions
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